Description

Olga Greenlaw kept the "war diary" of the American Volunteer Group--the Flying Tigers--while those gallant mercenaries defended Burma and China from Japanese aggression during the opening months of the Pacific War. Returning to the United States in 1942, she wrote The Lady and the Tigers, which war correspondent Leland Stowe hailed as "an authoritative, gutsy and true to life story of the AVG."

Out of print for more than half a century, her book has been brought up to date by Daniel Ford, author of the AVG's definitive history, Flying Tigers: Claire Chennault and His American Volunteers. What's more, Ford explains for the first time where Olga and Harvey Greenlaw came from, how they became caught up in the saga of the Flying Tigers, and what happened to them after their tumultuous year with the AVG.

About the author

Born in Mexico, Olga Greenlaw moved to Los Angeles as a teenager with her mother and sisters. She married a failed-up West Point graduate and joined him in China, where in time they were recruited by Claire Chennault to help organize and manage the American Volunteer Group, a covert force of US military pilots intended to help China resist Japanese aggression.

Daniel Ford has spent a lifetime studying the wars of the past hundred years. He was a reporter in Vietnam, earned a master's degree in War Studies from King's College London, and wrote the definitive history of Claire Chennault and the Flying Tigers. He edited and annotated The Lady and the Tigers with the help of Olga Greenlaw's sister, Alicia Schweizer, who is now buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

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From the acclaimed author of Hit the Target and Big Week, an in-depth account of the legendary World War II combat group, the Flying Tigers.

In 1940, Pearl Harbor had not yet happened, and America was not yet at war with Japan. But China had been trying to stave off Japanese aggression for three years—and was desperate for aircraft and trained combat pilots.

General Chiang Kai-shek sent military aviation advisor Claire Chennault to Washington, where President Roosevelt was sympathetic, but knew he could not intervene overtly. Instead, he quietly helped Chennault put together a group of American volunteer pilots.

This was how the 1st American Volunteer Group—more commonly known as the Flying Tigers—was born.

With the trademark smiling shark jaws on their P-40 fighters, these Army, Navy and Marine pilots became a sensation as they fought for the Chinese. Those who initially doubted them were eventually in awe as they persevered over Rangoon despite being outnumbered 14-1 by Japanese aircraft; as they were described by Madame Chiang Kai-shek as her “little angels” and by a Chinese foreign minister as “the soundest investment China ever made”; and as they ultimately destroyed hundreds of Japanese planes while losing only a dozen of their own in combat. Two of their veterans would later earn the Medal of Honor—and as a group, the Flying Tigers managed to rack up a better record than any other air wing in the Pacific theater. When Tigers Ruled the Sky is a thrilling and triumphant account of their courage and their legacy.

During World War II, a group of American fighter pilots roamed the skies over China and Burma, menacing the Japanese war effort without letup. Flamboyant, daring, and courageous, they were called the Flying Tigers. The Tigers, who had been recruited from the Army, Navy, and Marines, first saw action as a volunteer group fighting on the side of the Chiang Kia-shek's China against Japan. Trained in the unconventional air-combat tactics of their maverick leader Claire Lee Chennault, they racked up some of the most impresive air victory records of World War II. This is the story of Chennault and his magnificent Tigers — and how they performed the impossible.

"What God abandoned, these defended / And saved the sum of things for pay." 

In the bleak winter of 1941-1942, no American or British force could stem the tide in Southeast Asia, as the Philippines, Thailand, Malaya, and Singapore fell to the victorious Japanese. Only in Burma was there a ray of hope. There, over beleaguered Rangoon, a few dozen Americans clawed Japanese warplanes from the sky for a cash bounty from the Chinese government. Wearing mismatched uniforms, with Chinese insignia, and flying cast-off fighter planes, they did what no other air force seemed able to do, and won immortality as the Flying Tigers.

Daniel Ford wrote "the definitive history" of the American Volunteer Group, as it was formally known. Here, he has collected five e-books about the Flying Tigers into an omnibus that details the AVG's planes, pilots, and history as remembered in the United States and in Japan. An essential collection for every admirer of the Flying Tigers.

"The AVG's first encounter with the Japanese Air Force over Kunming, China,  on 20 December 1941 is often written about. The version Dan Ford presents  here is probably the most complete picture extant." (First Blood for the  Flying Tigers)

"I can wholeheartedly recommend his work to anyone desiring insight into  the early years of the JAAF" (Rising Sun Over Burma)

"Very well written and full of new information about a fascinating time in our history" (100 Hawks for China)

"A unique insight into how the Japanese appeared to the pilots meeting  them, and how the AVG learned to deal with them" (AVG Confidential)

" Draws aside the curtain of mythology and shows the AVG members--pilots, mechanics, nurses, and Chennault himself--as recognizable humans with a full spectrum of virtues and faults. Yet, the glory remains undiminished . . . A Flying Tiger's Diary is highly readable and is wholeheartedly recommended."—Military Review

The Flying Tigers, under the leadership of Claire Chennault, fought legendary air battles in the skies over Burma and China. This journal of ace pilot Charles Bond, now in its fifth printing, vividly preserves his experiences in aerial combat against the Japanese, all recorded within twenty-four hours of the action. It also documents the training and living conditions of the men whom Gen. Bruce K. Holloway has called "the most colorful group of warriors in modern times."

A limited, specially bound edition of A Flying Tiger's Diary, signed and with a laid-in print by Terry Pyles, is available while supply lasts.”

During World War II, in the skies over Rangoon, Burma, a handful of American pilots met and bloodied the "Imperial Wild Eagles" of Japan and won immortality as the Flying Tigers. One of America's most famous combat forces, the Tigers were recruited to defend beleaguered China for $600 a month and a bounty of $500 for each Japanese plane they shot down--fantastic money in an era when a Manhattan hotel room cost three dollars a night.

To bring his prize-winning history of the American Volunteer Group up to date, Daniel Ford has twice rewritten his original text, drawing on the most recent U.S., British, and Japanese scholarship, along with new information about AVG pilots and crewmen, their Royal Air Force colleagues, and their Japanese opponents.

"Admirable," wrote Chennault biographer Martha Byrd of Ford's original text. "A readable book based on sound sources. Expect some surprises." Flying Tigers won the Aviation/Space Writers Association Award of Excellence in the year of its first publication.

The greatest generation was a hardworking, strong, loving people wanting what is now called “the American Dream.” Each would be propelled from their neighborhoods and slow-moving communities, a safe haven that cloaked them and held them securely, into a world war of destruction and death on December 7, 1941. America had been awakened; Americans, a year earlier, saw and understood the evil destined for this country was now killing other peoples of the world.

These were to become a volunteer group of Americans assembled by two countries, America and China, to be the first to defend an innocent people. Today they are known as the famed AVG or American Volunteer Group, the Flying Tigers. Their story is as vast as the war itself; it touched those it affected with death and destruction as it consumed everything in its path. Within the pages of this book, the story of one pilot and one nurse will be revealed, from when they volunteer, meet, fall in love, and marry while defending and saving the babies, the parents, the citizens of China and Burma. Pete and Jane maintained their beliefs of duty and honor and sacrifice while they endured the horrors of war. Finding security in each other’s arms and a new spirit of love with each kiss, keeping them hopeful the war would end soon.

Black Sheep One is the first biography of legendary warrior and World War II hero Gregory Boyington. In 1936, Boyington became an aviation cadet and earned the “wings of gold” of a naval aviator. After only a short period on active duty, however, he was “encouraged” to resign from the Marine Corps due to his unconventional behavior. Remarkably, this inauspicious beginning was just the prologue to a heroic career as an American fighter pilot and innovative combat leader. With the onset of World War II, when skilled pilots were in demand, he became the commander of an ad hoc squadron of flying leathernecks. Led by Medal of Honor winner Boyington, the legendary Black Sheep set a blistering pace of aerial victories against the enemy.

Though many have observed that when the shooting stops, combat heroes typically just fade away, nothing could be further from the truth for Boyington. Blessed with inveterate luck, the stubbornly independent Boyington lived a life that went beyond what even the most imaginative might expect. Exhaustively researched and richly detailed, here is the complete story of this American original.

Examining wars from the allied victory in World War II to the conflict in Viet Nam, and finally to the operations in the Gulf and Kosovo, this book presents a comprehensive look at the evolution of strategic air attack theory and doctrine over the years.

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